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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/26297458">in the dark</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/tkreyesevandiaz/pseuds/tkreyesevandiaz'>tkreyesevandiaz</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>9-1-1 (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Cross-Posted on Tumblr, Domestic Fluff, First Kiss, Fluff, Fluff without Plot, I'm Bad At Tagging, Idiots in Love, Introspection, M/M, POV Eddie Diaz, Pining Eddie Diaz (9-1-1 TV), Short &amp; Sweet, Soft Boys, Soft Eddie Diaz, Tumblr Prompt, i think</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-09-05</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-09-05</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-06 09:00:20</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,624</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/26297458</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/tkreyesevandiaz/pseuds/tkreyesevandiaz</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>It's not often in the past ten years that Eddie's wanted something for himself, but now that he knows what he does...he doesn't plan on letting it go.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Evan "Buck" Buckley/Eddie Diaz</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>58</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>414</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>in the dark</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><ul class="associations">
      <li>For <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/kitkat0723/gifts">kitkat0723</a>.</li>



    </ul><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Hehehe hi guys.</p><p>Work is kicking me, and school just picked up too, so my fics will probably come slower now. Regardless, thank you for all the love!</p><p>This was a Tumblr Prompt requested by Kat &lt;3</p><p> <strong>44. Tentative kisses in the dark</strong></p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>If anything, Eddie blames it on the dark.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It’s always easy to forget, that this isn’t his. Not now, maybe not ever. It’s easy to forget that maybe he doesn’t deserve the contentment that he feels right now, doesn’t deserve the wash of security and safety that surrounds him in moments like these.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>But watching Buck swing Chris easily onto his back, galloping down the hallway to put him down for the night, he’s never </span>
  <em>
    <span>wanted </span>
  </em>
  <span>anything more. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Eddie can count on one hand the number of times he’s wanted something for himself in the past ten years. The past decade had been one after the other countless decisions made for his family, for his son, his wife — some of which weren’t his to make to begin with, yet he made anyway.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And he regrets it, regrets that he let all these life changes lash at his legs until he felt like he had no choice but to run. He regrets leaving Shannon alone to deal with those things, regrets missing six precious years of his son's life — all because of the proverbial 'the man is the breadwinner' mindset he was raised on, all because he was terrified of his life not being in his control. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He tries his best not to do that anymore, tries not to fall into the warped role of “provider” he grew up thinking was the only way to be, tries to understand that life <em>can't</em> be in his control any more than it can be in anyone else's. He tries to give Christopher a choice when he can, lets him make the decisions Eddie knows he can, tries to teach him not to be afraid to be overwhelmed. Tries to show him how to take a break without drowning himself in something he can't surface from.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>After all these years, it seems that all Eddie </span>
  <em>
    <span>can </span>
  </em>
  <span>do, is try. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He’s not mad about it — not at all. No one gets anywhere worth being without trying, without putting in effort. It’s the work put into the journey that makes one value the destination, and after putting himself through the wringer to finally get to a place where he feels he belongs, Eddie understands that. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>So the thing that cuts at him isn’t that he tries, it’s that...he feels like he fails. </span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Every </span>
  </em>
  <span>time.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Logically, he knows it can’t be true — not with the way Christopher is, even though Eddie likes to credit most of that to Shannon. But Shannon...she hasn’t been here in the past four years, some of Christopher’s most important formative years. So, maybe he has a little something to do with it too.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It’s a realization that took him months to accept. Through countless sessions with Frank (helpful), Bobby’s advice (very helpful) and Buck’s reassurance (unparalleled), Eddie was finally inching towards realizing that he’s grown and learned from the mistakes he made when he was younger. He thinks he's proven himself to be a good father, the father his son needed from the very start. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>But while watching Buck and Christopher together always melts his bones with the warmth that flares in his chest, tonight, there's something different. Tonight, he can feel his heart pounding against his sternum at the sound of Buck's rich laugh and Christopher's giggles coming from the bathroom.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He's still thinking over it, staring blankly out the window, when Buck plops back down on the couch next to him, unabashedly swinging his head onto Eddie’s lap and looking up at him expectantly.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You’re like a cat, you know that?” Eddie says, unable to mask the overwhelming fondness in his voice as he runs his fingers through Buck’s hair. He can feel the other man grow heavy instantly with one scrape of his nails against his scalp, eyes slipping closed, and Eddie laughs for it.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You’re the only one who says that,” Buck teases, a smirk flitting across his face. “Everyone else calls me a golden retriever.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m the only one who sees you like this” slips out of his mouth with no filter, and before Eddie can even begin the process of internally cursing himself for putting the words out where he couldn’t take them back, Buck’s answering him.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“That’s so not true, what about Christopher?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The reply is instant, eyes still shut, but the smirk has turned into a smile, and Eddie can’t stop </span>
  <em>
    <span>staring</span>
  </em>
  <span>. </span>
</p><p>It shouldn't come as a shock to him anymore <span>— not after months of spending virtually every free minute with each other. He doesn't even know why he's surprised; if anyone's affection and love for Christopher rivals his own, it's Buck's. And while Eddie had been in a place where he couldn't believe that a part of Buck's affection and love has always been directed towards him, too, he now knows how big of a privilege it is to have that for himself. He gets to play a part in making Buck feel safe enough to be vulnerable in the four walls of the Diaz home, and while being Christopher's father is the hat Eddie wears most proudly, being Buck's partner is one that he'd stack right with it.</span></p><p>
  <span>Before he knows what he’s doing, Eddie carefully drags a finger down Buck’s face, trailing over his birthmark, past the sweep of his cheekbone, down the hollow of his jaw, over the angle of his chin, and back up to the soft curve of his lips. He keeps his touch light, exploratory, eyes locked on his finger as it memorizes everything about the man he loves. His hand feels like it doesn’t belong to him, moving of its own accord across the planes of Buck’s face.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Eddie,” Buck whispers when the silence stretches thin. No, Eddie thinks, it’s not the silence that stretches thin. It’s the anticipation, putting them both on the teetering edge of the cliff they’ve been skirting towards for years, wondering if they’ll back up to safety again, or take the risk of free fall.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And Eddie wants this — not only for Christopher, but for himself. He wants to feel his stomach swoop at one of Buck’s grins without feeling guilty for it. He wants to stop berating himself for pining after his best friend, he wants to come home and fall on the couch between his son and partner. He wants to be able to love him as loudly as he wants. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He wants everything with Buck.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Eddie thinks the dark probably has something to do with it. Here, surrounded by nothing but the stillness of his home — <em>their </em>home — he’s vulnerable. Both of them are. Here, in the dark, the things that plague them in the harshness of daylight don’t matter; this is their time to let it all go and just <em>be</em>. So, Eddie lets himself fall into it, and trusts his partner to catch him when he does.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yeah?” he asks, mouth suddenly feeling dry.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Instead of giving him a verbal response, Buck leans up slowly. Eddie doesn’t see or feel him get off his lap; he’s too busy staring at him, where they’re one second away from throwing themselves down that cliff, the very one they can’t come back from. </span>
</p><p>The one Eddie refuses to come back from.</p><p>
  <span>The first press of Buck’s lips against his is unsure, tentative, slow. It blows his mind in the very first second, at the rasp of Buck’s evening shadow against his, the heat of his palm on Eddie’s waist, the steady beat of his heart under Eddie’s palm.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>They pull away from each other just as slowly as they’d come together. In the dim light of the room, Buck’s eyes blaze brightly, more alight than Eddie had ever seen them, mouth curved in a small smile. He can see the way his best friend braces himself for all the different ways that this could go, now that they’ve taken this step. It’s the same instinct that runs through Eddie’s blood, the same one he’s learned to recognize over years of waiting for the shoe to drop. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>But Eddie loves him. He's knows the magnitude of the word now, knows how important it is to the both of them, to the little boy sleeping just down the hall. He knows that his world has already shifted into place, knows that this is it for him. There's no one like him, and Eddie knows that from here on out, no one will ever compare to him. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He hadn’t planned on letting Buck go before, and he isn’t planning on it now, either.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>This time, it’s him who leans in first, capturing Buck’s lips with his own. Their second kiss is more confident, Buck shifting positions to straddle his lap smoothly, tilting Eddie’s head up in the process to keep them connected as they move softly against one another. Buck's hands cup his neck gently while Eddie's wrap around his back, trailing lightly over his shirt.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Digging his fingers into Buck’s waist, Eddie pulls back for a second, blinking up at him. Buck's beaming back at him with glassy eyes, thumbs moving in slow circles on the undersides of his jaw. With a jolt, he realizes that Buck's truly happy, just to be perched where he is, and to his surprise, </span>
  <em>
    <span>so is he</span>
  </em>
  <span>. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>There’s still a large part of him that wonders if one day, he’ll wake up and all this will be gone, but for that genuine adoration he can see plainly on his best friend’s face, Eddie would risk everything for it.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>So he asks him a simple question, one that he knows Buck will hear without him saying the words. “Yeah?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Buck lips curve into a slow grin, the very one that had Eddie doomed from the very start. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yeah.”</span>
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Eddie Diaz is literally the softest, I said what I said</p><p>Kudos and Comments make my day, so thank you to everyone who leaves them! I love hearing what you guys think, and anyone who takes time out of their day to comment has my heart and soul &lt;3</p><p>You can find me on Tumblr at <a href="https://www.tumblr.com/blog/zeethebooknerd">zeethebooknerd</a> or on Twitter at <a href="https://twitter.com/tkreyesevandiaz">tkreyesevandiaz</a>.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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